Only Among Teenagers Is It Steady As You Go.

October 02, 1985|By Judith Martin.

Dear Miss Manners--I have recently become involved with a wonderful but somewhat commitment-phobic young man. He is in his late 30s and has never been married, although he professes a great desire to have a wife and family eventually. About two weeks ago, this charming gentleman, whom I now believe I am in love with, professed similar feelings for me, and as I waited for the ultimate proposal he said, ``Let`s go steady.`` Feeling that half a loaf was better than nothing, and that the proposal was at least a step in the right direction, I said OK.

Now I wonder what I have actually agreed to. What are adult parameters for ``going steady``?

Gentle Reader--Miss Manners is sorry to tell you that going steady is strictly a teenage category. The stages of teenage relationships are:

Liking someone: This means that the two people have no direct relationship whatsoever, but at least one of them confides the state of his or her heart to all mutual acquaintances, who then use the information to make life miserable for the object of this affection.

Going together: This can consist of merely one date, or even as little as one evening spent paying attention to each other. Because it becomes public knowledge, the participants must ``break up`` in order to have a date with someone else.

Going steadily: This either means that one party is hedging because he or she likes the status of going steady but not the other person, and hopes to do better, or it means that one person`s parents have forbidden going steady.

Going steady: This is a standing date with certain privileges. A token of some kind is exchanged.

Secret engagement: There is a secret to a secret engagement only if one of the partners declares it without the other one`s knowledge. Secret engagements are announced to inform society that the privileges have gotten out of hand, or to justify that psychologically for one of the participants.

The adult stages are much simpler:

Friendship: Although this term is used to describe opposite relationships --an asexual one, or one of high passion--it always means that the couple has nothing romantic that it wants known.

Courtship: In its serious manifestations, this is a theoretically non-exclusive arrangement--one or both may have no emotional interest in going out with anyone else, but neither can demand it of the other--which is understood to lead either to a lot of heartbreak, accusations and other depressing late- night conversation, or to one or more of the following states.

Engagement: This is a public announcement and usually means that the couple plans to marry, sooner or later. The leeway of ``later`` allows fastidious people to use it instead of the alternative announcement of the following.

Living together: Formerly known as trial marriage and only announced by people who were hoping to give their parents heart attacks, this is now a common arrangement between one person who believes it to be an unbinding temporary state and another person who believes that it is a preliminary to marriage.

Marriage.

As an adult going steady, you have the disadvantages of the teenage rules (no looking at anyone else) while subscribing to the concept that going steady is as far as you can go, marriage not being considered a practical possibility.

That is Miss Manners` guess. However, to find out exactly what the gentleman means, say coyly, ``Oh, I don`t know--do you really think we`re ready yet to be practically engaged?``

If the reply is ``Engaged? Who ever said anything about being engaged?``